Saturday, July 27, 2013

XGame (2010)

It's no secret that I have a hard time sitting still.  Whenever I'm watching and reviewing a movie, it's hard to keep myself from doing something else, like organizing, sewing, making a to-do list, etc.  When I really want to force myself to unplug and pay attention to a horror flick, I always queue up a foreign film, since I have to watch it in order to read the subtitles.  I have an insane instant queue at this point (about 310 movies) so I'm slowly chipping my way through it.

XGame is about bullies, and hails out of Japan.  I was kind of a nerd in school, so I remember being teased a bit, but I do not recall bullying in general being as bad as it is today.  In XGame people who were bullied when they were younger are finally getting their revenge.  There are other murders taking place involving bullies and payback, but this specific story is about Mariko, who was relentlessly tortured by her fellow classmates.  One person tried to help, but was always ignored, since one of the bullies' parents was prominent on the board of education.  First, the teacher, who let the abuse happen, is given his punishment, followed by the students who coldly participated.

The former students are brought into their own classroom and forced to pick from the X-Game box that they previously created.  Punishments include: thumbtacks, milk challenge, dirty rags, frizzy hair, and even a death penalty.  Of course, the punisher has created far more extreme tortures than were doled out in elementary school.  The thumbtacks are a chair full of sharp nails.  The clothespin is a giant clamp on your arm. And milk chugging?  School lunch?  Grosssss.  The animations depicting the upcoming punishments were 8-bit and seriously creepy.  At some point, they all get a hot iron in shape of an X.

The end of this movie has a few interesting little twists that link all of it together.  And some extra little creepy scenes.  Also, you know, a whole little conspiracy thing.  Apparently people have this movie confused with another called "Death Tube."  Well I guess it is not that movie.  This was very reminiscent of Saw but it also reminded me a little of Bloody Reunion for some reason.  Of course, it was a little long....all Asian horror movies tend to have a longer showtime than American horror.

Overall, this wasn't my favorite Japanese horror movie ever, but it definitely had some redeeming qualities.  If you like Saw-style movies, you would probably enjoy this one, but prepare yourself to settle in for the two hours.  Happy watching!